May You Be Triumphant
by LittleLongHairedOutlaw
Summary: Seba wakes, and wonders where the three Hunters are now. Have they been successful? Or have things taken a turn for the worst? (Post-Killers of the Dawn).
1. Never Wrong

He dreamt about Larten, and that is what brought it to mind. Larten, sitting in the snow with the wolves at his first Council, looking forlorn. The memory - the dream - is at once so long ago and so recent.

Where must Larten be, with his hunt for the Lord of the Vampaneze? He and Vancha surely must have returned to Darren and the Little Person now. How are they faring? Have they been successful? No. They cannot have been successful yet. There would have been a message from one or the other of them if they had.

Seba sighs. The inside of his coffin is only so enlightening. He closes his eyes and sends a mental burst Larten's way. To know he is safe would be enough.

There is no response.

No response. No answering wave of mental energy, conscious or not. Silence.

No need to worry. Perhaps he had not been focused enough. He has just woken up, his head is still thick with sleep. It is perfectly reasonable that he had not mustered the mental strength.

Heart pounding, feeling vaguely nauseous, Seba tries again. And waits.

And waits.

And still the silence remains.

His eyes snap open and he pushes the coffin lid off. Nothing dire can have happened, surely. He is simply still too tired to put the required energy into it.

In a minute, and in spite of the stiffness still in his muscles, he is dressed and hurrying down the hall. The guards search him, and permit him entry. Mika is in his seat, thinking, and frowns when he sees Seba cross to the Stone of Blood.

"What-"

He is being ridiculous, Seba knows, but still he has to know, has to be certain.

He places his hands on the Stone and calls Larten's face to mind - hair stained orange from that ridiculous dye, the scar, the twitch of his lips when he is secretly pleased.

And the Stone is silent.

It dawns on Seba what that means. No response can mean only one thing but it must be wrong. (It cannot be wrong. It is never wrong. But-)

Even when he cut himself off from the clan, Seba could still track him from here, could still trace him through the mental link.

And now . . .

He allows his hands to fall away from the Stone, eyes burning, and turns to face Mika.

"Apologies," the word is a croak and Seba clears his throat to try again. "Apologies for my rude interruption, Sire." And that is better, more his own voice. "It appears grave misfortune has befallen the hunters." And the words he follows that with seem to tear down the mountain around him.


	2. Contemplative Reminisces

Hours later, having composed his thoughts, Seba sends a mental burst to Vancha. In all likelihood, he was there when . . . when it happened. Though he knows that his deduction is true, he needs to know for certain, needs to hear it directly from someone.

The response is quick, a confirmation of Seba's fears, and he expected nothing less. Still, the echo in his mind numbs him. The details do not matter now. There will be time enough for them when Vancha arrives at the mountain.

More than likely, it happened in combat. An honourable end, one to be proud of. They will list his name at the next Council and toast him. Drink to his memory and his deeds - finding the palace of Perta Vin-Grahl, leading the Nazis across Europe, travelling with Vancha to bring Arrow back to the clan, the vampaneze he slayed in battle. They will not know the torment and suffering, will know nothing of what happened on that ship to Greenland, or that human woman, or what passed between he and Wester. Not that Seba himself knows all of the details of that, but he is old enough to have come to his own conclusions, and he pressed Larten for information one night while his former assistant was maudlin and drinking. Darren (and how must he be dealing with Larten's death?) had taken to his hammock early out of exhaustion, giving Larten the space to withdraw into his own thoughts and Seba the time to talk to him.

"I killed him," Larten had murmured, already a barrel of ale in though it did nothing to improve his mood. "He killed Alicia, and framed the vampaneze. He wanted me to be the figurehead for his movement. Tiny planted the idea with him."

Seba had hardly believed the words he had heard. Wester, his Wester, killing Larten's human lover? When one puts it like that it sounds ludicrous. Yet, Larten was taught never to lie, though he may have appropriated Wester's words for his own once upon a time. And so if he says it, then it must be true.

All of those years later, and the wounds still festered in Larten's eyes. Seeing this, Seba had not pushed for further details and diverted the conversation from such painful topics. Larten got so drunk that night that by morning he had no recollection of the conversation, and Seba left him none the wiser.

Now, neither Wester nor Larten is living. Both of those boys - men - who had been sons more than apprentices to Seba are dead. And all that he can do is toast their memories, and pray that each has found paradise.

Seba settles into his coffin and sighs, pulling the lid down over himself. It will take some time for Vancha to arrive. Until then, well, he may just take each night as it comes. There is no cause to imagine how it could have happened. The important thing is that it was – hopefully – quick, and Larten did not suffer too much.

(It is only now that tears burn his eyes.)


	3. Wine and Ale

Seba has always favoured wine over ale. It is a simple matter of taste, and wine discourages overindulgence whereas ale encourages it. If he ever wished to take leave of his mental faculties - as he has witnessed many vampires do over the years - then perhaps he would choose ale. Such a time has never come and he suspects that even at this time of his life it never will.

Larten, though. While in Vampire Mountain, Larten always favoured ale. At first, Seba supposed that it was the simple reason most vampires favour ale - it tastes better and it is easier to drink more of it. But, after the incident with the people on the boat, and the later incident with the human woman, Seba came to the conclusion that Larten preferred ale because getting drunk naturally makes it easier to forget. Seba himself must admit that it was a relief to see Larten without the darkness lurking in his eyes, whatever it took to remove it. And for a brief time after Arra's death, the ale became a crutch, leading him to break out in humorous song in the late hours of the day, Darren long since rolled into his hammock. The presence of the boy certainly was a help to him in those dark days. For Darren he could put on a stoic face. Alone in the back of the Hall of Khledon Lurt, it was all too easy for the mask to fall away.

(Seba was never so grateful for his own decision against taking a mate than when he had to pull Larten away from the body of Arra Sails. And it really was a matter of pulling him. The man had taken her death as such a shock that logical persuasion had been of no benefit. (Later, over ale, (what else?), he had confided to Seba of their intention to mate again, before getting unbelievably drunk and stumbling back to his coffin.))

Seba would give anything to see his former assistant again, sunk into one of his dark moods or not. He knew, as Larten departed the Mountain with Vancha after Paris' funeral, that the odds of them meeting again in this life were slim. But logically knowing it, and having to face the reality of it are two very different things. An outpouring of grief, indeed, allowing the grief to interfere with his duties, would be unseemly. Larten would not want that.

But when Larten is dead, and his soul is - hopefully - at peace in paradise, does it really matter what he would have wanted? In spite of himself, Seba chuckles. It must be the cynicism of his years causing him to think such thoughts.

It is the sound of footsteps that cause him to wake from his ponderings, and he looks up into the pale, wan face of Vancha March.

"I came as fast as I could, Seba," he says quietly, eyes wet, voice far from its usual booming self. "I'm sorry."

Seba nods, his own eyes burning. "I know. I am sorry too."


End file.
